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Preparing to Teach

Building an Activity Catalog to Improve Course Design

As teachers and instructional designers, one of the biggest challenges we face is trying to come up with multiple creative and appropriately challenging activities for our courses. We have to consider the diverse needs of our learners and the goals of the course and then

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Meeting the Expectations of Post-Pandemic Students

In recent weeks, faculty members and their institutions across the nation and around the world have embraced the necessity of transitioning their courses to various remote delivery modes. While most faculty members have had to make some accommodations in their current courses, the necessity of

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Keep Calm and Redesign with Perspective

Sometimes we are asked to step in during an emergency situation when a colleague cannot finish teaching a course. Sometimes enrollment or structural changes mean we are unexpectedly assigned to take on a new course just days before the semester starts. And sometimes, beyond our

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Assignments Don’t Just Happen

I often wonder what students think about the assignments we create. In my experience, they frequently see assignments as having a limited and somewhat task-oriented relationship with their course work. Their concern about what counts for a grade is frequently one-dimensional and often usurps the

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Syllabi: Leveling the Playing Field

I’m a big fan of syllabi used well. On the crassest level—and it’s important—syllabi are contracts between faculty and students, contracts that administration holds us to. When a student makes a complaint, administrators want to be able to pull out the course syllabus and use

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On Common and Template Syllabi

When a course is offered in multiple sections, sometimes at different locations, and taught by different instructors and worthy of transfer credit, it’s important that the students taking it have the same course experiences. Depending on the course, there may be some or no flexibility

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Syllabus Feedback: Questions to Ask Students

Getting feedback from students can help you build a better syllabus. They’re the ones you’ve designed it for. They’re the ones who will benefit from using it. They’re the ones who experience a range of different syllabi. And they’re the ones who don’t see the

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Tips for Creating a More Inclusive Syllabus

According to the National Center for Education Statistics’ (2019) most recent data, 24 percent of college students are first in their families to attend college (p. 127). First-generation students bring a richness and depth to the student body, but navigating campus as a first-generation student

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The Syllabus: A Resource Guide

Various aspects of the syllabus have been studied, among them issues of tone, its use of images, its length, whether it’s “learner-centered,” and the effects of its being so or not. The studies highlighted here also illustrate the range of methodologies researchers have used to

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